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Topic: In need of assistance!!! (Read 12995 times)

Background: I have 3 boys, the oldest has Autism. With his Autism is a major food issue....he has what are known as food jags. He has a very short list of acceptable things he will eat....if given anything else, he would choose to starve. He is extremely skinny so this is not an option. His main jag right now is Pizza Hut hand-tossed style crust. I have tried many recipes to no avail. I am currently not working (just had a baby that requires surgeries) so continuing to buy him a large pizza a day from PH is a financial strain we can't handle much longer. I have a Cuisinart 800W stand mixer...but I don't have a scale or the best thing to cook the pizza on....although I will try to find both if given a good suggestion. I am a decent cook, but still pretty much a novice. I am an engineer so I do have the ability to learn, but I am feeling a bit overwhelmed reading through these threads. Can anyone help??

EEnotPizzaE,Don't dispair you should have no problem with someone hooking you up. I have no experience with the PH, but I can assure you that you can get by with out a scale. It just takes more time for the conversions, time to measure, and cleanup. There are a lot of links for volume to weight conversions. Here are two.

I wish I could personally help here but I have never eaten or attempted to make a PH hand tossed pizza. So I did a site search and could not find anything.I am just guessing here but:If the hand tossed is similar in texture to the pan pizza, but maybe not as thick, and maybe not fried in oil on the bottom like the pan version, then maybe the pan recipe could work with a few modifications?If maybe so, here are some links that might help.http://www.pizzamaking.com/panpizza.phphttp://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php?PHPSESSID=822e0e6e6c69149eb046e8e3e7fb895c&topic=6040.0Less dough for a thinner crust and very little oil on the pan might be a starting point.I looked at some photos of PH hand tossed and it sure looks like it was baked in a pan.Hopefully Peter will have some ideas and really provide you some help.Good LuckHog

Here's a picture from their site....so know this is best case scenario, not usually what is received, lol. If I could get a good crust that has the air bubbles and doesn't feel thick and taste nasty it would be a huge improvement over my previous attempts. I am not a pro when it comes to yeast, but I am trying to learn, and will take any and all tips you guys have. I did keep a PH box to use once I finally figure out a decent crust.

To the best of my knowledge, no one on this forum has attempted to reverse engineer and clone a Pizza Hut hand-tossed dough. But one thing I can tell you is that the dough that PH starts out with to make a hand-tossed dough is frozen. I know that from the PH ingredients list for the hand-tossed dough, at http://www.pizzahut.com/files/pdf/ph_ingredients.pdf. However, converting a frozen dough to a fresh dough version is not something that can be done with ease. It can take a lot of experimentation and there would be no guarantee that your son would eat the pizzas in the meantime. We also know the PH nutrition information for the hand-tossed pizzas, at http://www.pizzahut.com/Files/PDF/UpdatedPHBrochure01.11.10.pdf, but it is difficult to reverse engineer and clone dough/pizzas from that information alone. There is also the matter of coming up with a suitable equivalent for the PH pizza sauce. Again, we know the ingredients and their order of predominance from the PH ingredients list for PH pizza sauce, but there are many possible sauces that might be made based on the ingredients list, without any assurance that you will get close to a real PH sauce or that your son will eat pizzas with the sauce. It is likely that the cheeses you use will be better, with fewer additives and chemicals, than the cheeses that PH uses. So, I would be less concerned about the cheeses at this point.

Looking at the ingredients list for the PH hand-tossed dough, it seems to be similar to the ingredients used to make a Papa John's pizza or a Domino's pizza. I don't remember ever eating a PH hand-tossed style pizza, but the PH nutrition information seems to suggest that the crust is thinner than a Papa John's crust. I have had a lot of experience with PJ style pizzas and know how to manipulate the ingredients and quantities, including thickness, to achieve most objectives. I work with baker's percents almost exclusively, but as Bob mentioned there are tools that can be used to convert weights to volumes. The tool I use is the Mass-Volume Conversion Calculator at http://foodsim.toastguard.com/. As an engineer, you shouldn't have a problem using that tool. However, to the extent that you achieve results that suggest that you are winning the battle, you will want to get a decent digital scale. As best I can tell, your Cuisinart mixer should be usable to mix the dough.

If you'd like, I should be able to come up with a PJ clone dough that should yield a finished crust that is thinner than what I believe PJ uses for its own pizzas and that may be closer to what PH uses. I recommend that a good bread flour be used, preferably the King Arthur brand of bread flour, which is the flour that I usually use for the PJ clone doughs/pizzas.

A point to keep in mind is that both PH and PJs use pizza screens to bake their pizzas. For a large pizza (they are 14" at both PH and PJ), you would want to use a pizza screen that is at least 14" in diameter. Pizza screens are sold by most restaurant supply stores and also online. You can see what a pizza screen looks like at http://www.wasserstrom.com/restaurant-supplies-equipment/Product_119991. If you do a Google search, you will find many many other places that sell pizza screens.

It might also help to know what kind of PH pizza your son likes (e.g., cheese, pepperoni, etc.)

Let me know if you would like me to proceed. In the meantime, you might want to take a look at some of the photos and read a few posts in the PJ clone thread at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,6758.0.html. Doing that might tell you if a PJ type of pizza is something that your son might eat. You might also take a look at the thread at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,1707.0.html. I mention that thread because I made "thin" versions of another member's Papa John's style pizzas. You might even discover that one of the recipes at the abovereferenced threads will work as is for your purposes. I wouldn't expect any pizza on this forum to look like the photo you posted. Even PH's pizzas from their own stores are unlikely to look like the professional photos at the PH website.

This is where his latest jag gets strange....he wants the "cheese off" which means I have to scrape perfectly yummy toppings off of his pizza.....he removes most of the sauce as well. This is why the crust is so important...lol. It doesn't have to be exactly like the PH crust, but similar in thickness....with the bubbles, color etc. The rest of the family would eat it normally....and we usually stick to pepperoni.

eta I bought the cuisinart because of the 800W....knowing I would be doing mostly pizza and bread doughs

also eta I totally don't expect anything to look like their advertised picture, so now worries there

« Last Edit: March 03, 2010, 04:19:38 PM by EEnotPizzaE »

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scott123

What you said in your first post- put it in a letter to PH. Include, if possible, an official sounding statement from your Doctor backing up your story. Ask them for the recipe. Offer to sign a confidentiality agreement. I really kind of doubt they'd be that protective of their dough recipe.

2. Write the manager of your local restaurant and ask if he'll give you a special price on a cheeseless pie. Cheese is, by far, the most expensive ingredient on a pizza. Also, inquire if they'd be willing to sell you frozen dough balls. Again, explain your entire situation and include corroboration from someone official so they know you're on the level.

Corporations like PH can be pretty cold and heartless, but, after hearing your story, I really doubt they'd be THAT cold and heartless.

I doubt very seriously they will divulge the recipe, and even if they did the ingredients are undoubtedly proprietary and the recipe would need to be tweaked for retail flour.

I think the best suggestion is to buy the dough frozen. But I wouldn't tell the store manager the situation -- in doing so you disclose that you have no other option so they can tell you no and your only option is to buy a pie a day form them. Instead I'd tell them that your son has a severe food allergy to dairy. Hence your need for cheeseless pizza. They might want to cook it and make you buy it every day.Tell them that you can't risk any cross contamination and having the pizza cooked in their assembly line process presents that risk. Also, cooking a pizza with no cheese in the oven that is calibrated for fully topped pizza's, it will burn.It is simplest for you and them to just sell you the dough.

On a couple of occasions I tried to buy a dough ball from Papa John's. I was told that it was against company policy to just sell dough and, moreover, there was no provision in their point of sale system to cover the sale of dough only. I have read of a couple cases where Domino's sold just dough balls but they charged full pizza price.

On a couple of occasions I tried to buy a dough ball from Papa John's. I was told that it was against company policy to just sell dough and, moreover, there was no provision in their point of sale system to cover the sale of dough only. I have read of a couple cases where Domino's sold just dough balls but they charged full pizza price.

Peter

Unfortunately, I can see why. As a business it would be running a risk. The person that handles the dough could contaminate it and then not cook it fully and cause illness -- creating a liability for the person that sold the dough.

I don't know much about food selectivity/refusal in autistic children and have never been through it, but it seems to me that finding a solution to the pizza crust problem won't be a permanent solution.

Have you thought about simply keeping a pizza hut box and making a NY style pizza and putting it in the box? It is doubtful a kid that age has a palette to really distinguish one from the other. I haven't had a PH pizza in years, but from what I recall teh hand tossed is similar to a NY style but a little denser than what we typically make here, so I'd back on the hydration a little.

I would prepare the dough and bake the pizza using the instructions given for the two-day (cold fermented) Papa John's clone dough as described at Reply 20 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,6758.msg59217.html#msg59217. In the absence of a digital scale, I would convert the weights of flour and water to volume measurements using the Mass-Volume Conversion Calculator at http://foodsim.toastguard.com/. I suggest using the Textbook method of flour measurement as defined in that tool. For the ingredients other than flour and water, I would use the volume measurements given in the above table. There is no need to use a clone of the same bench flour blend (Dustinator) that PJ uses. It will also not be necessary to dock the dough skin unless you have seen PH use a dough docker. However, a pizza screen should be used.

I recommend that King Arthur bread flour be used in the above formulation but I think any good bread flour, bleached or unbleached, can be used. PH uses vital wheat gluten (VWG) in its dough but it is not clear whether that is to increase the flour's protein content or to provide the same or other function in a frozen dough, such as strengthening the dough. Since I don't recall ever having a PH hand-tossed style pizza, I do not know what kind or brand of flour they use. It could be an existing commercially available flour or a proprietary blend.

The above formulation should produce a dough ball that forms a skin that is thinner than a Papa John's skin but with an ingredients profile that is similar to PJ's based on the PH dough ingredients list. I substituted table sugar for high fructose corn syrup in the above dough formulation because it is unlikely that you will have a source of the HFCC. I have been told that regular corn syrup, such as Karo syrup sold in supermarkets, is not the same as HFCC.

With eight ounces of cheese, six ounces of pizza sauce, and about 45 pepperoni slices (about 3.2 ounces), the unbaked PH clone pizza should weigh around 36 ounces. There will be some weight loss during baking, which is likely to be more than a real PH hand-tossed style pepperoni pizza baked in a conveyor oven, but that is largely unavoidable in a standard home oven.

Depending on the results achieved, it should be possible to make changes to the above dough formulation. One thing you might try sometime if you decide to invest in a digital scale is to weigh a 14" PH pepperoni pizza that you purchase from PH. I would do this as soon as possible after buying the pizza because a pizza loses weight as it cools down. You might also count the number of pepperoni slices. This data might help in making adjustments, if needed. If you weigh the unbaked pizza and its value after baking, that should give you a pretty good idea as to the percent loss of weight in your particular oven and oven configuration.

If you decide to proceed with the above, feel free to ask any questions that you may have.

After I last posted, I recalled that there was a more recent PH ingredients list than the one I posted earlier. It is at http://www.pizzahut.com/Files/PDF/PIZZA%20HUT%20INGREDIENT%20STATEMENTS%202008.pdf. As you can see, PH brought out the chemistry set for the later version of the hand-tossed style pizza dough. That dough is clearly a frozen dough. Other than the dough conditioners, the major change was to substitute "partially hydrogenated soybean and cottonseed oil", which is essentially margarine or vegetable shortening, for the soybean oil. If you are interested, I can modify the dough formulation I gave you in my last reply to substitute margarine for the soybean oil. Margarine contains about 15-20% water, which may require adjusting the hydration percent somewhat, but that is not a problem.

Thanks so much for the replies....I stopped getting emails so I was surprised to see so many. When his thing was Wendy's chicken I tried to buy bags of it from them, but they don't do business that way, and I can understand. I want to make pizzas myself, I just know my current methods were making some sorry pies that he wouldn't touch. I did save a box, but it has to be pretty close in appearance to fool him. Thanks for all your time Pete, I may have more questions later when the boys are asleep and I can really read the details.

Pete - I have finally had a moment to read through some of the threads you have linked in your replies. I do believe I would like to try the thin PJ clone with a 2-day fridge time. What are your mixing secrets for the stand mixer? Do you always hand knead the dough for a minute, or only if it still seems sticky? How important is the KA bread dough....will it just ruin it if regular AP flour was used? What about the oil...is soybean oil the only way to go?

I just need to know what all I have to search for at the grocery store.

Where to start...where to start....I would like to try to make a pizza tomorrow while he is at school to have ready to go in the fridge (he is fine with it being heated up in a microwave)

Getting excited!

eta: is there an ideal pizza screen size for what I am wanting to make?eta later: what do you know about dough dockers? I know from looking at the PH hand tossed that they definitely use one....

I should be able to come up with a "thinner" PJ dough formulation for you to try. It will be based on the Papa John's dough formulation at Reply 20 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,6758.msg59217.html#msg59217. It should be possible to substitute all-purpose flour for bread flour but that will require lowering the hydration a few percent. I have not personally used all-purpose flour with my PJ clones since I was trying to replicate what I believe PJ does with its doughs. PJ has always talked about using high protein flours so that suggested using bread flour or a higher protein flour. My preference has been the King Arthur bread flour and it is the one with which I have the most experience with the PJ clone doughs. For a different bread flour, I would most likely tweak the hydration based on the brand. Is there a particular brand of all-purpose flour you would plan to use?

There are no secrets for mixing the dough. I describe the precise mixing method I use in the abovereferenced Reply 20. I am not familiar with the Cuisinart stand mixer you have or the attachments that come with it, so you may have to try to replicate my methods using your mixer and attachments. I have rarely had problems preparing the dough in my KitchenAid stand mixer. I habitually knead the dough ball for about 30 seconds to a minute after it comes out of the mixer, mainly to be sure that the dough has been adequately kneaded and feels right and to shape it into a nice round ball.

As far as the oil is concerned, you don't have to use soybean oil even though that is what both Papa John's and Pizza Hut use. Soybean oil is sold in the supermarkets as "vegetable" oil. Other oils can be used but I would not suggest using all olive oil, although a light olive oil might work. You can use canola oil, or a blend of soybean oil and canola oil, which supermarkets also sell, but some people do not like canola oil because they think that it has a "fishy" taste. Vegetable oil is inexpensive and just about every major oil producer sells it. There are also many supermarket house brands.

eta: is there an ideal pizza screen size for what I am wanting to make?eta later: what do you know about dough dockers? I know from looking at the PH hand tossed that they definitely use one....

Amie,

I use a 14" size screen, which is the same size as the pizza and makes it easier to get the shape and size right. However, you can use a larger screen but I perhaps wouldn't go above 16" since a larger size might not fit in your oven with the door closed.

The dough docker I use is shown in the second photo in Reply 1 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,5173.msg43961.html#msg43961. If you'd to defer purchase of a dough docker until you have succeeded with coming up with a pizza your son will eat, you can use a kitchen fork to dock the dough skin provided that you are careful as to not completely pierce the dough skin, which does not happen with commercial dough dockers because they have blunt pins. I like the dough docker I have but there are many other designs made of plastic that are less expensive than mine.

Some of our members have given poor grades to Pillsbury flours so you might want to look for a different brand. If you can't find any King Arthur bread flour, you might look for the Better for Bread flour. You might also look for some vital wheat gluten (VWG). Bob's Red Mill and Hodgson Mill are two popular brands sold in supermarkets. The VWG could be used to increase the protein content of whatever bread flour you end up with. VWG is an ingredient of the Pizza Hut doughs, so the flavor might not be alien to your son.

Without trying the Better for Bread flour, it is hard to say what its effects will be on the finished dough. It has a protein content of about 12% versus the 12.7% protein content of the King Arthur bread flour. That is one of the reasons I mentioned the VWG as a possible dough addition to bridge the protein gap. Also, since you will be using a different mixer than what I use, that can also affect the dough processing steps and the condition of the finished dough. BTW, if you decide to use the Mass-Volume Conversion Calculator at http://foodsim.toastguard.com/ to convert flour weight to volume measurements, you will want to use the Harvest King flour in the pull-down menu. That flour was renamed Better for Bread over a year ago. As you can see, all of the above variables can affect the results you will achieve. However, for now, I would be inclined to use the dough formulation given below. You may have to tweak the amount of flour and/or water to get a nice, smooth, malleable dough but that is natural when there are several variables involved as mentioned above. The objective for now is for you to be able to make a credible pizza. Changes to the formulation can come later once you see if the finished pizza you end up with meets your needs and the needs of your son.